The email I received two weeks ago was par for the course. “Are we related?” it asked. The writer was 7,500 miles away, in Israel, and the answer was most definitely, “Yes we are.”
It turns out the relationship is a distant one. In fact, we’re third cousins. We share the same great-great-grandfather. I’ve detailed the exact relationships in this branch of the family in a graphical tree (with pictures) and in a text tree (no pictures). I’ve also detailed the three other branches of my family, from each of my grandparents, in separate trees.
Such is the way “digital genealogy” plays out in the modern age. My new-found cousin had been searching the Internet for references to his late father and turned up a link to one of the family trees I have posted here. (The reason I posted the trees is so that people using search engines can find family members, and me, and get a sense who we’re all related.)
Since I figured out how to turn the family trees into online documents—which was a huge learning curve I finally conquered last Halloween—I’ve had a half-dozen or so inquiries from people asking if we’re related. One cousin stumbled across the family- tree link while Googling for information on her mother’s ballet performances. Another researcher came across the family tree because one of my distant relatives was married to one of her distant relatives.
It’s actually been great fun for me to correspond with, and in some cases to meet, members of my extended family—instructive, interesting, and informative.
I figure if I’ve had six hits in six months, who knows what the future will hold!